Workforce diversity entails a company incorporating different people as employees irrespective of their gender, age, race, mental ability, generation, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation. The effects of globalization triggers increased interaction among people from different backgrounds in this era (Stikkelbroek et al., 2016). As a result, business owners need to accept employees from all across the globe to improve their competitive edge. Organizations that have already embraced the workforce diversity register many advantages as well as increased challenges in managing their workers. The primary focus of this paper is addressing the benefits and challenges faced by an organization with diversity in their workforce.
Many organizations embrace workforce diversity due to the need for increasing creativity in production and accepting the effect of globalization in bringing change. The principal motivation of adopting diversity in the workforce is because it increases productivity (Edmondson " Harvey, 2018). Teamwork if well managed and governed leads to increased production in any organizational departments. Different talents are deployed to work toward a common goal will, therefore, increase the output of an organization. According to Edmondson C. A and Harvey F. J. (2018), teamwork increases the productivity of an organization when well integrated. Consequently, organizations that incorporate diversity in their employees have an increased rate of production.
Additionally, employee diversity creates a platform for workers to learn and grow professionally. The exposure resulting from employee differences, introduces new cultures, perspectives, and ideas to the workers. Consequently, individuals get a deeper understanding of their colleagues and the reasons for their shortcomings (Hajro, Gibson " Pudelko, 2015). Since xenophobia is relevant at places of work, working with colleagues from different continents reduces the fear and later on leads to free interactions with other people in spite of their recognized differences from others. Different people working together share out their abilities and also acquire new skills which help them to grow professionally, and this promotes self-satisfaction and growth of self-esteem. Some employees may feel curtailed by their culture to communicate and argue out their issues and points to the other team members. Communication barriers experienced in some cultures which allow male chauvinism, creating women not to interact in teamwork appropriately. Different cultures understand different norms differently which creates conflicts within an organization. Some members may perceive deceptions and mocking, which in reality is a norm of a particular culture.
Diversity also improves the organization's brand and culture. Incorporation of different people in the workplace enriches the company's culture. Since every employee brings a diverse talent and skill to the organization, this impacts positively on its brand. The majority of the companies are employing millennial since they are energetic whereas other older generations bring in work experience. Research shows that when people are looking for employment, they use diversity as a prerequisite of the best place to work (Stikkelbroek et al., 2016). When people with different professions and talents come up and team up together, great creativities and innovations will increase which helps the organizations to meet their strategic opportunities. Creativity and innovation are achieved through combinations of ideas and finally execution of changes. When different minds come up together, they can be able to innovate new brands for an organization. Therefore, the diversification of the workforce leads to increased creativity and innovation (Hajro et al. (2015).Diverse minds, share ideas when they come together for particular problems. They are therefore more likely to come up with better solutions than a single person. Organizations make them team up and get solutions to issues facing the firm which helps management to make well-informed decisions.
According to research, workforce diversification increases problem-solving in organizations, this will, in turn, have a positive impact on the organization’s productivity. People from different backgrounds feel appreciated which alleviates their self-esteem which at the end motivates them to continue working at the organization (Mohammadi, Broström " Franzoni, 2017). Talent retaining puts the organization at a better competitive level. Furthermore, workplace diversity leads increases the morale and positive attitude towards work among the employees. A well-managed variety in cultures leaves all employees validated, and feeling appreciated despite their distinguishing characteristics. As a result, organizations that promote workforce diversity have broader market shares. Diversity opens opportunities across the globe where several companies have begun franchises due to their acceptance of individual differences in their workforce.
Moreover, a diverse workforce helps the organization to satisfy customer needs by creating and innovating new services and products. It also strengthens the company-customer relationship with specific customers propagated by effective communication (Mohammadi, Broström " Franzoni, 2017). An organization with a diverse range of employees reduces the chances of encountering a language barrier. Therefore, since all customers are represented in the workforce, the production depart can liaise with the human resource in customizing their products to match the different needs of a specific market target. Customer satisfaction increases organizations market share and also retaining of its customers. For instance, the United States employers prefer to hire bi-lingual company representatives to communicate effectively with their customers. The organization, therefore, competes globally with international organizations. Alibaba firm is the productivity example of such a scenario. Challenges related to diversity have increased over the years.
Despite the proven advantages of diversity in organizations, these challenges act as barriers to success. Language barrier is a leading challenge in the workplace. Despite the variety of languages benefiting the company-customer relationship, the employee faces a problem of communicating effectively with each other. Since languages differ in meaning, an employee may misinterpret instructions and comments from their fellow employee causing the affected party to decrease his productivity (Benschop et al., 2015). The presence of diverse cultures in the workplace affects the productivity and cohesiveness of social groups. Therefore, individuals who identify with these groups are profoundly affected in executing their duties thus slowing down the organization's operations. Consequently, the cohesiveness of the small social groups in the office often results in discrimination.
Discrimination may be based on an individual's sexual preference, gender, education level and their position in the company. Women are frequently facing discrimination when considering promoting the organization's staff. Some of the reasons given for denying highly qualified women the promotion is that they are often absent due to problems with their children and maternity leaves, as well as the accusation of being too emotional (Benschop et al., 2015). These reasons make women unreliable in high positions. Additionally, discrimination based on ethnicity and race appear in a diverse workforce. Employees with minority representation in the ranks of power, feel discriminated if no one from their race gets a promotion during performance appraisals (Garnero, Kampelmann " Rycx, 2014). According to statistics, studies indicate that racial minorities in the workplace are still experiencing differences in the wage-gap while the race with a majority of the employees experiences a higher salary as compared to their counterparts.
Moreover, some employees and managers in the organization oppose workforce diversity despite the benefits it brings to the company. In circumstances where the organization does not handle the opposition well, the rigid employees may bar the diversity implementation from achieving the intended benefits to the company. Implementation challenges usually occur when introducing a new precept in business (Mohammadi, Broström " Franzoni, 2017). However, organizations may avoid the obstacles to implementing diversity by notifying their current employees on the benefits of diversity. Therefore, employers must initiate strategies for successful implementation to reduce frustrating the productivity of the employees.
After the implementation of the diversity strategy, the managing of the diverse workforce becomes a challenge. The common problems involve using a wrong approach in solving problems associated with diversity. The introduction of affirmative action is a course of action taken by many organizations, but does not the issue of diversity in the workforce. Additionally, hiring employees entirely by race may disadvantage the reputation of the organization (Mohammadi, Broström " Franzoni, 2017). Furthermore, it is difficult to accommodate each employees' beliefs based on their religion, culture and political opinion. The conflicts that arise when trying to harmonize these differences may have detrimental effects on the organization (Carter, 2018). Different people have different cultures and perception; these differences may be perceived negatively in different people’s setups. Cultural biases and negative notions can bring a lot of difficulties in the organization.
However, diversity is adopted to enrich the organization's workforce invokes fear in the management of operations. These fears include the consequences of glorifying individual differences in the organization. Research indicates that overemphasis on certain individuals compromises the cohesiveness and effectiveness of teams. Team players need to agree on pursuing a specific goal together as opposed to working individually (Garnero, Kampelmann " Rycx, 2014). It is proven that homogenous groups are easy to manage and develop than heterogeneous groups. Nonetheless, heterogeneous groups yield the best results after the members solve existing conflicts.
Freedom of speech in a diversified office is challenging due to the existence of unfamiliar cultural boundaries. People are afraid of expressing their true feelings about an issue due to the increased risk of offending a colleague (Garnero, Kampelmann " Rycx, 2014). Consequently, this affects the effectiveness of communication which reflects in decreased employee productivity. Conversely, financial expenses increase due to the programs and training required before diversifying the organization (Carter, 2018). The training conferences aim at educating the employer and current employees of the advantages, challenges, and disadvantages caused by diversification. Therefore, if the company is operating on a tight budget, paying for these seminars and lectures may affect normal operation at the firm. Other challenges include unhealthy competition among workers, increased disrespect between workers which later results in prejudice and discrimination.
In retrospect, a diverse workforce has more advantages than disadvantages hence it is good for organizations achieving its visions. An organization with motivated employees has satisfied customers which translates to higher sales and larger market share. Additionally, high employee productivity improves the reputation of the organization and its brand. A diversified company has more opportunities to expand their business across the world as compared to those who reject workforce diversification. However, adopting a diversity approach poses many challenges to the management. Different people tend to think and make decision differently which leads to slowing down the organizations relying on teamwork. Moreover, many diversified organizations still record cases of discrimination and prejudice. Reports indicate that racial, gender and wage discriminations are widely experienced in such companies. Therefore, the management should devise ways of inhibiting such biases before they destroy the brand and reputation of the organization. Despite the outlined challenges in workforce diversification, the approach has benefitted a lot of organizations that have maximized its advantages and minimized on the challenges and disadvantages.
References
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